Hoover, more often than not, is typically a house of horrors for South Carolina baseball and Tuesday was no different for a Gamecock team fighting to host a regional.
Entering the week understanding each win inches them closer to a potential regional host slot, the Gamecocks were walloped 9-3 Tuesday by Alabama and are eliminated from the SEC Tournament.
Now, the Gamecocks head back to Columbia after one game in Hoover with their hosting fate in the committee members' hands.
“It’s frustrating but it wasn’t meant to be. We had a plan. We went with our plan, which I think was a sound plan,” Mark Kingston said. “When it doesn’t go your way you need to continue to have your players’ backs, teammates need to have each others’ backs and focus on the next opportunity you have. The next opportunity we have is the NCAA Tournament, which very few teams in the country have that opportunity. We’ll be ready to go.”
South Carolina (33-21, 16-15 SEC) entered with an outline of the game—get through four innings with a combination of starter CJ Weins and John Gilreath and rest some banged up infielders—that quickly went sideways with the Gamecocks falling behind 8-2 after just four innings.
Things started to snowball for Weins in the third when he struck out a batter but allowed him to reach on a wild pitch. That sparked a six-run inning for the Tide Weins (1-1, 4.50 ERA) didn’t see the end of.
He’d leave after a RBI double and two walks—one intentional—loaded the bases with two outs.
Gilreath gave up all three inherited runners to Alabama with a single and a three-run homer to left field, and the Tide would tag him for two more in the fourth.
It would be a bevy of self-inflicted wounds for the Gamecock pitching staff, walking six batters and Weins picking up five wild pitches, four in the third inning alone.
“The third inning was too early to go to (Julian) Bosnic,” Kingston said. “That was a lot of pressure on your bullpen to bring guys in the third inning. We weren’t going to do that. We hoped to get to the fourth inning and hopefully the fifth before we handed the ball off to the key bullpen guys on the back end. We just didn’t do it. It is what it is."
The Gamecocks had opportunities early in the game—getting a man on three times in the first six innings—but couldn’t come up with a big inning to get the team back in it.
They’d get three runs, all on homers—a two-run smash from Braylen Wimmer and Wes Clarke’s 22nd homer of the year—but would get the leadoff man on in four innings and hit just 1-for-12 with men on base.
“It’s very frustrating, especially when all of us planned to go pretty deep in this tournament. That’s why we set up the game we did today to use a lot of guys so we can have our big arms ready for the next games,” Clarke said. “It happened to not workout. It’s very frustrating. At the end of the day, when the season comes to an end and our team is in Omaha this isn’t going to matter one bit.”
They’d put the leadoff man on base in five innings but hit just 1-for-12 with runners on base and stranded five.
South Carolina, which is undoubtedly in the tournament, came into the week knowing it essentially controlled its own destiny but now has its hosting fate in the hands of the committee and will find out in six days where they’ll be playing in a regional.
“It really stinks,” Brady Allen said. “Our whole team knows how good of a team we are. Coming into today and losing in the opening round we didn’t get to show it. It’s pretty upsetting.”
